Maidens of Virtue: Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten builds on Chapter Nine's theme of "siblings are the only friends worth having" by telling the moralistic story of Lydia.   One day, Lydia sees a group of public school kids bullying a little girl.  Lydia intervenes causing the bullies to scatter and she comforts the little girl by telling her a Bible story.  When Lydia returns home, she tells her mom about the encounter with great indignation - at which point her mother reminds her of how much she hurt her sister's feelings when they fight.  Lydia is overwhelmed with remorse at her cruel ways and apologizes to her sister Jennifer.   Everyone presumably lives happily ever after surrounded by fresh-baked, home-made cinnamon muffins. 

After my first read-through of the book, the only things I remembered about the story were the strange inclusion of ecstasies surrounding the scent and taste cinnamon muffins at random points in the story and that Stacy McDonald managed to write a dead-on (and damn funny) teenage sister - to - sister insult around cooking.

All of the quotes from this chapter are from the conversation between Lydia and her mother; the rest is dross.  The first quote is Lydia and Jennifer's mother deftly turning the conversation away from bullying of a stranger to fighting with a sister:

When we imagine sins of the tongue, we tend to think of gossip, cursing, or lying. What you witnessed today was an example of purposeful verbal nastiness. But sometimes our careless words are just as injurious within our own families - maybe more so. Sometimes the careless remark to a sibling about some physical feature or a hasty joke about a particular habit or personal quirk is harmful.

Do you remember last week when you and your sister, Jennifer, were arguing? She pointed out your unmade bed and lack of diligence in keeping things as neat as you probably should. When your feelings were hurt by her drawn-out rebuke, you said some rather unkind things about her cooking skills. (pg. 97)

 I spent a few minutes looking back on every fight I could remember between my twin sister and I.  We rarely insulted each other; when we were young, we would occasionally have a knock-down-drag-out brawl in our bedroom as silently as possible to avoid getting in trouble for fighting.  When we were old enough that a fistfight could end in serious damage, we pretty much screamed "I hate you so much!" at each other and refused to talk to each other.  My parents treated callously insulting other people as being as serious as a physical fight - and didn't use insults towards each other during fights.

I am completely and totally certain that I never ever decided it was time to point out really minor housekeeping lapses by my twin sister or brother.  I never heard a conversation like that among any of my female friends and their sisters, either. My parents made it clear that parenting was their responsibility not ours.  They ignored tattling and let us know we were free to disregard officious over-reach by siblings so by the time we were teenagers there's no way I would try to tell my sister that she needs to be neater around the house.   There was another reason we didn't bother picking at each other's housekeeping skills as teenagers - we had lives.  We were both taking challenging academic classes, participating in after-school activities, and working at a local store.  This greatly reduced the number of fights due to boredom and isolation.

Notice that Lydia's mom's disapproval at Jennifer's bizarre self-appointed policing of Lydia's housekeeping skills is limited to the fact that Jennifer's rebuke was too long rather than the fact that Jennifer was taking on a parental role to her sister.

Lydia winced as she remembered the sarcastic way she had suggested that Jennifer would probably never make much more than boxed macaroni and cheese and instant pudding for her future husband and children. She had taunted Jennifer with a few more comments about her most recent cooking failures before she had gone to bed angry that night. How did she develop such a caustic tongue? (pg. 98)

I adore Mrs. McDonald's ability to capture the catty but inspired meanness of a teenage girl!  That's a pretty good burn in a society that promotes housewife skills as being critical to being a Godly, marriageable woman.

Lydia asks a good question about where she learned to insult others - and the story glosses over the ugly answer.  Mrs. McDonald writes for a home schooling, family integrated church audience so blaming the influence of bad peer relationships doesn't work; the kids don't spend enough time around peers unsupervised to learn a new swear word let alone master the art of personal insults. Hell. Lydia reports to her family that she's met a new friend when she describes rescuing a girl about half her age from bullies.   No, Lydia learned insulting others at home.   Cutting insults must happen frequently enough that Lydia's not terribly disturbed by the row she had with her sister.  Likewise, her mother - who never earns a sign of individuality like a name - apparently listened to her two teenage daughter ripping each other apart and did nothing to stop the fight or reprove her daughters.  In my opinion, she's either spineless or enjoys setting the kids off at each other - and the next quote makes it clear this cancer of insults runs through the family.

" Yesterday after dinner," Lydia's mother softly reminded her, " I noticed Jennifer fighting back tears when one of the boys made a slight comment about the gravy being lumpy. I know she would not have thought much of what an eight-year-old thought of the gravy, especially after his third helping, that she not already been wounded by your words about her cooking." (pg. 9

This family needs an intervention on manners!  My parents never made negative comments about each other's cooking or the cooking of anyone.  Doing that would be inconceivably rude towards someone who worked hard to make a meal for you.  Instead, elementary school boys have already learned that they can be rude - as well as hypocritical - to women without any fear of reprisal.  That kind of behavior doesn't appear out of nowhere.  The kid learned it from his parents.  I wonder how often Lydia's father complains about the cooking of his wife.  I'm equally horrified by a mother who hears a bratty snippet of a son insult his sister's cooking and merely listens in on the conversation until a few days later where she blames Lydia's earlier comments for Jennifer's hurt feelings instead of her obnoxious son's behavior.  Lydia deserves the blame for the hurt surrounding her jab at Jennifer about only being able to prepare processed food; she had nothing to do with Brat Brother's inane comment about lumpy gravy.

This family need to spend less time baking cinnamon muffins and more time learning to treat family members with respect.